Secretary Duncan answers questions at the Hispanic Twitter Town Hall. Official Department of Education photo by Joshua Hoover.
An engaged audience with a broad range of questions joined Secretary Arne Duncan on Twitter and via video yesterday to discuss education issues facing the Latino community. Duncan was joined by José Rico, executive director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics, and guests from Latinos in Social Media (LATISM). In all, Arne and José answered more than 20 questions. Here is a sample of some of the topics discussed:
We cannot have a strong Unites States without a strong Latino community ^Duncan #hispaniced
— WHI – Hispanics (@HispanicEd) February 8, 2012
College Affordability
@ergeekgoddess @ArneDuncan Q#2 – In the wake of stats confirming college debt #1 among students, how do you propose to alleviate burden?
— Victoria Cepeda (@Vicky522) February 7, 2012
College debt is greater than credit card debt;this worries the President tremendously ^Duncan #hispaniced
— WHI – Hispanics (@HispanicEd) February 8, 2012
El Presidente ha logrado reformas importantes en cuanto al Pell Grant y los prestamos estudiantiles ^Rico #hispaniced
— WHI – Hispanics (@HispanicEd) February 8, 2012
Parental Involvement
Parent involvement is key for students success. How can we get more resourses that focus on parent engagement?#HispanicEd
— Dolores Huerta (@DoloresHuerta) February 8, 2012
Parents need to partner with their child’s teacher as part of the solution to ensure academic success. ^Duncan #hispaniced
— WHI – Hispanics (@HispanicEd) February 8, 2012
Early Learning
Latino children who participated in a high-quality #earlyed program showed dramatic gains in cognitive & language skills #HispanicEd #latism
— Efrain Nieves (@efrain_nieves) February 8, 2012
The best investment we can make as a society is in high quality early childhood education. ^Duncan #hispaniced
— WHI – Hispanics (@HispanicEd) February 8, 2012
Early Learning resources are being improved in Latino communities but participation remains low. ^Rico #hispaniced
— WHI – Hispanics (@HispanicEd) February 8, 2012
To see all of the tweets from the event, check out @HispanicED on Twitter, and to see the archived video of the event, click here.
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In my opinion, “Dark Age” policies such as the one below, which seek to deny races an understanding of their past is not only unconstituational, immoral and unethical but will ultimately lead to the demise of those races if not the entire species–it amounts to intellectual genocide and a supreme failure of leadership. Is this what we now stand for as a country? How can an entire nation sit idly by and let its civil liberties be eroded in this way, when so many men and women have fought and died to preserve our way of life, unique in its “melting pot” origins. Cultural diversity needs to be celebrated and uplifted, appreciated for its complementary differences forming a stronger union, promoting understanding and tolerance rather than shaming entire races of people and perpetuating hatred under the false guise of righteousness? Education in this country must be fundamentally rebuilt, on solid and sound ethical principles–not filtered, bound and gagged by policy makers who prefer to keep future generations ignorant, fearful and ashamed of their heritage. How dare this kind of oppression go on in this day and age in our own country. It is disgusting and has to stop. -a former @EdTechLeader
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College education should be free or almost free like in other developed countries, which they are surpassing USA in knowledge and sciences.